About “July ’64”:The night of Friday, July 24th, 1964 started off normally enough in Rochester New York, stiflingly hot and humid; but by the next morning no one would look at race relations in the North the same again. July ‘64 takes a penetrating look at the underlying causes of the riots or urban insurrections that swept through Black communities like wildfires that summer and in years since.

Trailer

About Enough Is Enough:The work of Enough Is Enough is twofold. First, we accompany people going through the criminal justice system who have experienced police brutality, racial profiling, and harassment by the Rochester Police Department. We offer emotional and tactical support, demystify the law, attend court proceedings, and provide direct support e.g. rides to meetings with lawyers or court appearances; and secondly, we work toward systemic change in law enforcement through policy recommendations supported by aggregate data and personal testimonies of police violence in our community.

About the film and discussion series:Enough Is Enough (EIE) has been an integral part of the campaign to pass the Police Accountability Board (PAB) here in Rochester, NY. It looks as if City Council will act in the spring of 2018. Enough Is Enough and the over 75 supporting organizations and affected individuals have moved into the next chapter of this campaign: getting an ordinance passed by City Council that gives the community control over their police department.

The experiences of systemic police violence, structural racism, poverty, degraded housing stock and red lining, lack of jobs, and inadequate education led many communities of color in cities across the nation, including Newark, NJ, and Rochester, NY, to rebel against the oppressive conditions they faced (and continue to face today). Race rebellions consumed Rochester, NY in July 1964 and Newark, NJ in July 1967. The struggle for racial, political, and economic justice continues in both cities, and across the nation.

Over the next few months, EIE is going to be hosting several film events and discussions culminating in a (hopeful) panel discussion. The purpose is primarily educational: to highlight the similarities between Newark, NJ and Rochester, NY and show how one city, Newark, was able to pass its Civilian Complaint Review Board (CCRB), which essentially houses all the powers that activists and community members have been demanding for the last half century, and more recently in the proposed PAB, in Rochester:

The PAB must be an agency of the city, independent of the Rochester Police Department (RPD);

The PAB must have independent investigative authority;

The PAB must have subpoena power;

The PAB must have disciplinary power over officers who are found to have committed misconduct; and

The PAB must have the authority to assess, review, and make changes to RPD policies and procedures.

We begin this series with “Revolution ’67.” We will then screen “July ’64” at the end of the month. In March, we will show “Policing the Police,” a documentary updating viewers from 1967 to 2016 where Newark’s new CCRB was passed into law. After this screening, we may screen a new film looking at Oakland, CA’s police department, called “The Force,” and discuss their new Police Commission, a cutting-edge piece of legislation granting disciplinary power among other powers to the Oakland community. Finally, the series will end with an as yet TBA panel discussion possibly with representatives from Newark, Rochester, and Oakland.

The film series has three goals:

to be an educational opportunity to inform the public about the PAB;

to compare Newark and Rochester, the struggles in each city, and highlight the very real possibility of getting a PAB here in Rochester; and

to be a mini fundraiser for EIE.

Documents pertaining to each city will be available for participants to take home and review.